Core Faculty

Julia Davids is in her second year at North Park University as the Stephen J. Hendrickson Endowed Chair in Music. She directs the University Choir and Chamber Singers and teaches music education. As a soprano soloist, Julia is an avid performer and recitalist specializing in early music. She has co-authored a book that will be published by Waveland Press in 2012, Vocal Technique – A Guide for Conductors, Teachers, and Singers. Julia is a proud founding member of the Canadian Chamber Choir, Canada’s national choral ensemble providing a professional-level choral environment for Canadian singers, conductors, and composers. Artistic director of the CCC since 2004, she has led the ensemble on concert and workshop tours of Alberta, Ontario, Manitoba, Nova Scotia, and Saskatchewan and directed their debut recording, “In Good Company.” Julia is the music director of the North Shore Choral Society, a 140-voice community choir. She also serves as director of music ministries at Trinity United Methodist Church in Wilmette. A native of London, Ontario, Canada, she now resides in Skokie with her husband, baroque violinist Martin Davids, and their two children, Judith and Solomon.

Joseph Lill is in his 20th year as a faculty member at North Park University, where he conducts the Jazz Ensemble and Concert Band, and supervises student chamber ensembles. An active performer in a variety of idioms including jazz, classical, and popular, Dr. Lill has been leading his own band, Six of One, since 1980. He has performed with such Chicago-area orchestras as the Ravinia Festival Orchestra and the Evanston Symphony, and with a variety of area big bands such as the Chicago Grandstand Big Band and those of Bill Porter and Bill O'Connell. He is frequently called on as a guest soloist, clinician, and adjudicator.

Keyboardist Terree Shofner-Emrich has established herself as one of Chicago's premier pianists as a soloist, ensemble player and accompanist. Shofner-Emrich joined the faculty at North Park in 1989 and served as director of the School of Music for seven years. She is pianist for the Chicago Symphony Orchestra (CSO) and Symphony Chorus, where she has worked with many of the world's leading conductors. During her summers with the CSO at Ravinia, she has played with violinists Miriam Fried and Gil Shaham, and, most recently, with world-renowned bass-baritone Bryn Terfel. As coach/accompanist for the opera program at North Park, Shofner- Emrich has prepared Ralph Vaughan Williams' "Riders to the Sea" and the world-premier of Philip Seward's "Spreading the News," among others, and has also prepared musicals for the Theater Department.

Tom Zelle currently serves as the music director of the North Park University Chamber Orchestra. Additionally, he is active as a choral conductor, clinician, church musician, and educator. At North Park, Dr. Zelle co-directed the recent two-year residency of world reknown violinist Midori and pianist/accompanist Robert McDonald. During this residency he conducted performances of the violin concerti of Beethoven and Sibelius. As a native of Hamburg, Germany, Dr. Zelle received his initial musical training at the conservatory of Luebeck. From that institution, he holds the highest German degree in church music/organ performance.